Just a nice time to remind admins and community that to me, comment downvotes without explaining why you were wrong, or silly, or whatever, sometimes feels like bullying.
The same as deals, I would prefer that it is necessary to add your own response to a comment before downvoting. Once one person has commented and downvoted then others can add their own downvote without having to add another comment. This fairly safely assumes the first person explained why.
Thoughts?
I find OzB particularly civil and positive compared to the bulk of the Internet. Even sites with a similar demographic (e.g. Whirlpool or newspaper websites) have much more conflict. When people say dumb or rude things the neg vote is a digital roll-of-the-eyes, but there are many more + votes handed out than -.
but there are many more + votes handed out than -.
That is a technical limitation though…
@jv:
Maybe if we didn't have the captain of the Australian negging team commenting so frequently…
I don't think I've ever run out of negs, so I am maybe too optimistic that people are more likely to +.
They need to make the buttons bigger; sometimes people downvote my comments when they mean to upvote.
Try looking at it as validation. Thats how I see it :)
Seriously?
I'm not a huge fan of downvotes either, I try to use it only if someone is being a.Super Rude to someone else or b.Full on attacking them.
I kind of get the feeling some questions are like "hi guys tell me your thoughts on x" and if most people are pro x, anyone against x gets a bunch of downvotes which I personally believe stifle discussion not make it grow.
Maybe I'm too attached to the votes, I'll admit, sometimes when things are feeling ergh, a bunch of downvotes are a little disheartening.
What I kind of like though is how on some reddit pages they don't show the number of downvotes, they just show that its score hidden or below votes or something similar. You (and everyone) knows its a downvoted comment without seeing the total amount of negs, is it 1, is it 5, who knows :O.
Anyways just my 2 cents. I don't know if its really big enough to warrant a change but anyway.
Hope everyone has an awesome day!
only if someone is being a Super Rude
Define 'Super Rude'?
Judiciously Vain?
Vain?
I'll bet you think this post is about you
Don't you?
Don't you?
At least list who downvoted like upvotes. Why hide it?
Downvotes clearly sting some users, enough to create venedettas. Then it becomes a waste of the mods time.
You would think having identity attached would make people more circumspect in downvoting, but I don't think that really happens.
This was confirmed by Neil when OP asked a similar question 5 years ago: https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/873186/redir
It's like a teacher saying: "O'Doyle, if you're going to punch Billy do it from behind in the dark so I won't be breaking you guys up afterwards".
The only reason it's not a major issue is because the vast majority of OzBargain's user base is anonymous. It doesn't take long when reading the news to confirm that anonymous cyberbullying of real people is a serious issue with serious consequences.
I'm not saying OzBargain is responsible for all of its users' behaviours. But for all we know there are people that react in an extreme manner to their anonymous profiles being anonymously judged. Since users are anonymous and rarely communicate in the real world we'll never know what percentage of dormant OzBargain accounts were due to suicide?
I'm a big believer in being civil and engaging with people with whom you disagree, but I think the Internet has trained people to "vote" as a short hand way of expressing themselves.
I'd urge people not to take negatives to heart, but perhaps if you attract a whole bunch of unexpected down votes consider if what you said could misinterpreted, or is controversial in some way you hadn't considered.
And sometimes people are just dicks. I like to imagine all my downvotes come from pimple faced 13yro boys, too immature to understand my great wisdoms :-)
Yes…. lots of dicks out there.
not all ozb members are male.
Yeah….. I know….
Don't have to be a male to be a dick
Why do some people get so upset about a digital plus/minus next to their name?
Fair dinkum. Harden up.
Why do some people get so upset about a digital plus/minus next to their name?
They should wear it as a badge of honour!!!
I guess some people are insecure about how they are perceived and some are not.
Red is the new green.
It should be thumbs up or down not + and -.
I'm sure a few posters have gotten really depressed over negative votes. This is a concern and many will go in deep recluse over it thus result calling helpline.
It should be thumbs up or down not + and -.
Then you'd be discriminating people who are thumb amputees. We need 'equality' remember… '+' and '-' does not discriminate.
Easy there Commodus.
Not sure how a "thumbs down" would be interpreted any different to a "-". It's the same bloody thing!
Besides, most of the time a quick stab of the "-" button doesn't require an explanation when the person is being a boofhead. I'm sure as hell not going to waste my time posting something along the lines of "I agree that "xxx" is being an idiot" when someone else has probably more eloquently pointed out their shortcomings and I could press the "-" button instead.
Besides, unless you deserve it why be bothered that some random negged you?
comment downvotes without explaining why you were wrong, or silly, or whatever, sometimes feels like bullying.
Maybe seek some help?
It might be due to a bad childhood experiences. eg. Kids hiding your lunchbox at school etc.
I personally don't put too much value on internet points.
…until they are able to be traded.
That would be glorious
Has anywhere done an ICO to run their reputation systems on a blockchain? Surely only a matter of time. It's cryptocurrency reddit gold.
I personally don't put too much value on internet points.
Agreed! Badges are the real store of wealth.
Yay! A SJW thread to start the morning. Bullying compared to downvotes. People getting butt hurt over imaginary fake internet points. If someone doesn't have enough internal fortitude that a few downvotes can send them on some depression downward spiral, I would suggest the issue is with that person more so than the distribution of fake internet points.
While I have found that there are a lot of downvotes sheep out there, that when they see a downvote, they just hit that negative button even when the person has made a good and/or valid point, it doesn't cause me any lost sleep.
Where do we stop the cotton wool wrapping of society? Ok, so let's say you win and all the negative votes and ability to negative vote is removed from the site. What then? Let's remove all negative words like don't, can't, won't and the rest, so as not to offend. And who gets the moral compass to say what is and isn't offensive?
I say, let there be negs. Let users get downvotes. If they get butthurt, then let them learn either how to deal with it, or let it stand that their comment was seen by some as not being appropriate or against the majority. I don't want to live in a world where my opinion is less valued simply because you got your feelings hurt.
Im glad you wrote this. I was thinking it, but I thought, the effort to type the point across Geez !! Matter of fact, i think the mods should de-restrict downvotes not this limited to 5 crap.
Maybe it's just me. Let's go a bit meta for a sec: I see your valid comments and the time taken to contribute to the community. If I felt the need to disagree with your thoughts I would reply and add to the discussion. However someone has downvoted you without saying why. That's pretty rude isn't it? I could understand if you were being an idiot or grossly misinformed but you clearly are not. You are taking time to add your thoughts. So here is my upvote.
Not really no, I think you taking this whole internet thing quite personally. Its just internet dude.
I think the current system works well in that, unlike Reddit and the like, here users are limited to how many down votes we can use. I feel the quality of down votes is improved if people know that they only have 5 and those 5 have to count.
As for any debate on the internet, it's best to be level headed, stick to facts and avoid name calling and personal opinions. That's usually what ends up getting users negged.
I don't feel the need to always back up my negative vote because at times the person I am negging does not deserve my time nor anyone elses. It's more of a case that some people are trolls, so no amount of explaining your neg will help the situation.
A few weeks ago in another thread about parking at Maccas for a coffee garnered one user over 400 neg votes. I don't want 400 people justifying their vote if most of them agree with what other users have already said.
Neg and move on. Unless what you have to say will change the flow of the conversation, is pivotal to the story or hasn't been said already, then it's probably a moot comment.
comment downvotes … feels like bullying.
Just get off the internet, it's obviously far too much for you to handle.
In other places of the world we have displacement by war and famine, genocide, slavery and hurricanes / tornados tearing up communities.
In Australia, we have Downvotes.
Now for a deal on one way flights to Myanmar.
This was discussed recently: https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/306482
It's hard to deny a negative vote is confusing as hell on any website. It's like a report button without an explanation.
When you say it can be used for bullying, there are people that will say things like "Don't get so upset you delicate little creature" without appreciating the irony that people often downvote because they're delicate little creatures that can't express their emotions in words. If anonymously negging a comment is so important then why not have anonymous comments?
For some reason it's considered universally appropriate to display upvoters…
RacistPete "Purple eyed people should be imprisoned"
+ BlueEyesRock
+ BrownEyes4Lyf
- 14 other voters
ProgressivePete "Purple eyed people should not be imprisoned"
+ Equality4All
+ TightTogether
+ SameSameAss
- 45 other voters
Anonymising negative votes serves to hide the identity of those people against perceived popular public opinion. But everyone knows scotty will work with a future totalitarian government to deanonymise all of OzBargain's data and we'll all end up in the gulags anyway.
If you not ok cos someone downvotes your comment on the internet then you not ok. Dont even need to ask, go get help
Think about how stupid the average person is. Half of them are stupider than that. Waste no time focusing on downvotes / upvotes noise.
Internet forums are here to provide a platform where it is not necessary to understand things in order to argue about them.
Is there some way to downvote the OP?
A downvote is an opinion.
We live in a free democracy, so be grateful we have that freedom.
How the poster reacts to a vote is a personal decision.
Only s/he decides how to feel/react/respond.
The only way to avoid downvotes is not to comment.
i couldn't care less if downvoted. most likely it's from some 20 year old virgin who lives with mum and dad paying off a 100k hecs debt.
Would a quota system work be good in conjunction the daily limit, ie no more than 10% of your votes can be downvotes?
Are you ok?, live a little, don't get too emotional over down vote. Over the time I think I have done it too.